Of more importance, however, is the group of private tutors who settled at Oxford, found a clientèle among the University students, and frequently wrote and published French grammars for the use of their pupils. There was evidently some demand for instruction in French at Oxford early in the sixteenth century. The bookseller John Donne enters a book called Frans and Englis twice in the register of books he sold in 1520;[525] this may have been either Caxton's Book in French and English, or the similar collection of dialogues printed by Pynson and Wynkyn de Worde in turn.
The first book for teaching French printed at Oxford was due to a Frenchman called Pierre Morlet, a native of Auteuil, who taught French at Oxford in the last decade of the sixteenth century. His Janitrix sive institutio ad perfectam linguae gallicae cognitionem acquirendum was issued from the press of Joseph Barnes in 1596.[526] The dedication, dated from Broadgates Hall the 5th of March of the same year, is addressed to Morlet's former pupil, Sir Robert Beal. This rare little treatise contains a few observations on the pronunciation of the letters, followed by a concise treatment of each part of speech in turn. It is preceded by a number of commendatory verses in Latin and Greek, tributes from Morlet's pupils, students of the various colleges. Morlet had previously prepared a revised edition of Jean Garnier's French grammar, which was published at Jena in 1593,[527] no doubt before his coming to England.
As might be expected, most of the early Oxford French grammars, written for the use of Oxonians, differ from those published at London in that they are composed in Latin. They differ further in containing no practical exercises and restricting their contents to rules of grammar.
All the French grammars published at Oxford were not due to Frenchmen. In 1584 a Spanish refugee, Antonio de Corro, resident at Christ Church, after acting as minister of the Spanish Church in London, had anticipated Morlet by adding a few rules on French pronunciation and accidence to his Spanish Grammar,[528] written in his own language. This was subsequently translated into English in 1590 by J. Thorius, also of Christ Church, and printed in London as The Spanish Grammer with certaine Rules teaching both the Spanish and French tongues. Several grammars were likewise produced by Englishmen resident at Oxford, and teaching the French language. Among others was John Sanford, or Sandford, chaplain of Magdalen College, and the author of the French grammar which succeeded Morlet's. Sanford wrote in Latin, and entitled his work Le Guichet François, sive Janicula et Brevis Introductio ad Linguam Gallicam. It was published by Joseph Barnes in 1604,[529] and dedicated to Dr. Bond, president of Magdalen. Sanford compiled his observations on the pronunciation and parts of speech from the various French grammars published in both France and England; he drew largely on Morlet, as well as Bellot and Holyband; and made equally free with de Bèze, Pillot, and Ramus.
He varied his duties as chaplain by giving lessons in French. In 1605 he was teaching French to that "hopefull young gentleman Mr. William Grey, son to the Rt. Honourable Arthur Lord Grey of Wilton," and found "good contentement" in his "happy progresse therein." Called away temporarily by other duties, Sanford made an English translation of the Latin work, which he addressed to his young charge "as a pledge of my duteous love towards your good deserts, and as my substitute to supplie my absence, being willing also for your sake to make a publicke use therof." The Janicula appeared in its new form, much abridged as well as translated, in 1605, under the title of A Briefe Extract of the former Latin Grammar.[530] It is significant that although this English translation was printed by Barnes at Oxford, it was mainly intended for a London public, and was "to be sold in Paules Church Yard at the signe of the Crowne by Simon Waterson."
SALTONSTALL AND LEIGHTON Sanford retained his position at Magdalen for some years after the appearance of his grammars. In about 1610 he was travelling abroad as chaplain to Sir John Digby, whose acquaintance he had made when Sir John was a student at Balliol.[531]
Other well-known English teachers of French at Oxford were Wye Saltonstall and Henry Leighton. Wye Saltonstall came of a noble family in Essex. He was educated at Queen's College, Oxford, where "his descent and birth being improved by learning, flatter'd him with a kinder fortune than afterwards he enjoyed his life being all Tristia." He is said to have then gone to Gray's Inn, Holborn, without taking a degree at Oxford, and afterwards to have become a perfect master of French, which he had acquired during his travels. In 1625 he returned to Oxford for purposes of study and converse with learned men. There he taught Latin and French, and was still living in good repute in 1640 and after.[532]
Henry Leighton, on the other hand, had not so good a reputation at the University. He is said to have been a man of debauched character, and to have obtained the degree of M.A. in anything but a straightforward manner; when Charles I. created more than seventy persons M.A. on the 1st of November 1642, Leighton, who then bore a commission in the king's army, contrived to have the degree conferred on himself by presenting himself at dusk, when the light was very low, though his name was not on the list. When the king's cause declined, Leighton, who had received the greater part of his education in France, and was an accomplished French scholar, settled at Oxford as a teacher of French, and had a room in St. John's College. Apparently he continued to teach French until 1669, the year of his death.[533]
He was the author of a French grammar written in Latin, called Linguae Gallicae addiscendae regulae, printed in 1659,[534] and again in 1662. Beginning with rules for the pronunciation of each letter, the author passes to observations on the articles, nouns, pronouns, and verbs; he then returns to the pronunciation, gives fuller rules for the more difficult sounds, and closes with a list of irregular verbs.[535] Leighton says he published his work at the request of his friends. He dedicated it (in French) to Henry O'Brien, baron of Ibrecken, only son of the Earl of Thomond, expressing, in words very like those used by Holyband on a similar occasion, the hope that this "divertissement," as he calls the grammar, may help to while away time not occupied by more serious and important studies. Thus we see that the general attitude towards the study of French was still, in the middle of the seventeenth century, very much what it had been in the preceding century.
In the meantime other grammars had appeared from the pens of French sojourners at Oxford. One, Robert Farrear, a teacher of French, wrote a grammar in English for the use of his pupils, The Brief Direction to the French Tongue, printed at Oxford in 1618. Nothing further is known of its author. Anthony à Wood[536] informs us that in the title of the book Farrear inscribed himself M.A., but "whether he took that degree or was incorporated therein in Oxford" he could not discover.